The majority of Moose Jaw, Sask. residents have voted for the city to pay for replacement cast iron water mains from city revenue instead of using a Local Improvement Program.
During the municipal election Wednesday night, 79 per cent, or 8,361 people, voted for a resolution that would have the City of Moose Jaw replace water and sewer mains using general city-wide revenues and/or reserve funds, and not from local improvement project special assessments.
READ MORE: Moose Jaw, Sask. to decide on water main referendum
Twenty per cent, or 2,186 voted against the referendum.
Former mayor Deb Higgins, who was elected in 2012 and is a career politician in the area, was ousted by Fraser Tolmie. Tolmie had 53 per cent of the vote and Higgins had 31 per cent of the vote.
Tolmie said he thinks the people voted for the city to use its own revenue because all homeowners understand the financial burden.
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“The water main connection is a community, it’s paid by all citizens and that’s what my belief was,” Tomlie said.
During his campaign Tolmie, who lost the 2012 race to Deb Higgins with around 600 votes, said he was against a Local Improvement Program (LIP), a funding model to pay for cast iron water replacements. He also was not in favour of LIP during the last election.
“I said that we needed to approach different levels of government to let different levels of government know that this is not just a municipal problem,” Tolmie said.
“I’m going to stay to that. I believe that we need to do that but as the mayor, you chair the budget community and we’re going to have a process where we listen to the councillors.”
Earlier in the year, Moose Jaw city council approved LIP.
Citizens Advocating Sensible Taxation (CAST) has driven the opposition to LIP, and their petition triggered this referendum.
Through LIP, the city would have paid 70 per cent of the water main replacement cost and homeowners paid 30 per cent. Residents could have either paid a lump sum or add it to their property tax for 20 years with a four per cent interest rate.
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